Tag Archives: Glenn Kreider

Two of my favorite professors, Drs. Glenn Kreider and Mike Lawson, have impressed upon me the importance of defining terms. When you have uncertainty as to what you mean, then others will too. Therefore, I want to talk about the five methodologies in Christian education and what I mean by them.

Why would I want to do something as dull as that?

For one, because I want to be clear in communication. Two, as I work through this idea, this process will help me solidify my own thinking and distinguish it from other lines of thought. Three, as I think through the implications of how to apply it in various settings, it will help that process the more precisely I can identify the methodologies themselves. Four, I realize that I conceive of these definitions in their ideal sense, recognizing that when you take institutional realities and sin nature into account, distortion occurs.

My caveat: these working understandings may change as I gather more information and incorporate it.

Communication and rhetoric: strategies for persuading others for behavioral change. This involves a good faith transaction on the part of the hearer and the speaker, where the hearer acts in good faith to assume the speaker has something useful to say, and the speaker acts in good faith that the hearer will give consideration to the words of the speaker. These fall under the broader term of dialectics.

Leadership and management: strategies for organizing people and processes for the purpose of creating an meaningful change, or resisting change, in the environment. Leadership involves the people side while management tends to involve the process side (although it’s difficult to draw a hard line between the two). These fall under the broader term of administration.

Teaching and learning: strategies for shaping the mind (knowledge, values, and will) of the individual. Teaching refers to the acts and strategies of the teacher while learning refers to the acts and strategies of the student. These fall under the broader term of education.

Policy and evaluation: strategies for developing and implementing operational principles and determining the effectiveness of those principles. These fall under the broader term of governance.

Research and modeling: strategies for gathering information, and for predicting outcomes based upon that information. Recognize that specific research methodology varies by field, even though the general strategies remain the same; natural science research looks different than social science research, even though both generally employ the scientific method of hypothesis, testing, conclusion.

Parents, your children use these strategies when encountering the world, and you need to encourage and cultivate them. Churches, consider how you might use these to organize your volunteers, to structure your ministerial strategies, and to train the people in your church. Teachers, recognize these as the primary drives of your students and teach them how to harness these drives in order achieve academic success.

May the words of our mouths and the meditations of our hearts help others to be acceptable in God’s sight.

Definition #2: Sometimes I talk about it in connection or contrast to the home and the academy as a location for Christian education. In that case, I’m referring to the institutional, organized assembly where the new covenant community of the Spirit gathers to receive the ordinances and participate in the communal ritual expressions of faith. That definition is long and clunky, and I’m working on shortening it, but it’s what I have so far.

Definition #3: Rarely I refer to the building where the new covenant community of the Spirit assembles to participate in the communal ritual expressions of faith. This doesn’t happen often, however.

Definition #4: Rarer still, I might talk about the church in connection and contrast to the historical Israel of the Bible (Old Testament). In that case, I most likely mean the seed (descendants) of Abraham in relationship to God through the New Covenant. By this I mean the spiritual heirs of Abraham (Galatians 3:29) and inheritors of the promise. This means that not all descendents of Abraham will inherit his promise, but this should not surprise anyone (see Ishmael, for one example).

My other half would point out to me that I need to answer the “so what” question, as in, “So why should I care about this definition?” Firstly, I answer this question so that you, the reader, can understand what I mean, but that’s about me. I would encourage others to think through what they mean by “the church” when they refer to it, recognizing that, like me, they probably mean a couple of different things. Secondly, our understanding of the church influences our behavior when we carry out the mission of the church. My first definition implies something about what I believe the Bible to communicate about God, my relationship to God, how I should relate to others, and how I should relate to his creation. It all ties to the New Covenant and shapes how I will educate my children and lead my family. Thirdly, note that I have not defined the church as the body of Christ. I do this because, as I understand it, the New Testament uses the body of Christ as a metaphor to describe the church, rather than define it, a subtle but important distinction.